Sacha Baron Cohen’s “The Dictator” follows one of his raucous, crude characters in an entirely scripted situation, a departure from his previous hits “Borat” and “Bruno,” where the butt of the joke was often on unsuspecting participants who would inevitably be shocked and disgusted. With “The Dictator,” I have to believe the butt of the joke is, by design, the audience, not because “The Dictator” is unfunny, which it is, mostly, but because its humor consists of throwing one (generally toothless) offensive or shocking thing after another at the audience, almost as a litmus test to see who’ll laugh.

It’s supposed to make you uncomfortable, I get it, and I’m no shrinking violet when it comes to risqué comedy, but I would like a comedy to come with jokes I find funny if it’s also going to judge me for laughing at it.

Cohen plays General Aladeen, a dictator of a fictional Middle East nation who rules his people with an iron fist. A trip to New York City — and a coup d’état at least partially orchestrated by the CIA, with a body double stepping into his place — sends him unrecognizable, stranded and alone into the city, where he meets a vegan feminist (Anna Faris) and takes a job at her grocery store. He has to somehow convince the world that he is the real dictator before the body double in his place does the unthinkable: brings democracy to his country.

Cohen is, as ever, committed to his role, but the material isn’t fresh and the satire is half-hearted. A big disappointment. $30.99 DVD, $40.99 Blu-ray.

“A SEPARATION”

Winner of the 2011 Academy Award for best foreign language film — and a nominee for best original screenplay, which is high praise given to a foreign film from the Academy, given their tendency to focus on American films almost exclusively — “A Separation” gets so complex and involving it’s almost miraculous, the sort of film that has the drive and narrative focus of a gripping thriller while telling what amounts to a low-key story of white lies, good intentions gone awry and irreconcilable moral issues. There are no easy solutions in “A Separation,” and the film is remarkable for it.

Set in modern-day Iran, the inciting incident surrounds Nader (Peyman Moadi) and Simin (Leila Hatami), a couple married for 14 years who now are petitioning for divorce. Simin wants to flee Iran, given largely unspoken tensions in the country, to seek a better life for her daughter (Sarina Farhadi). Nader will not move — he is the primary caretaker for his elderly, Alzheimer’s-afflicted father — and he won’t grant permission for his daughter to leave the country.

This situation is not resolved, and as Simin moves out of their apartment, Nader must hire extra help — a pregnant woman (Sareh Bayat) whose husband (Shahab Hosseini) has recently fallen on hard times — to take care of his dad.

But an occasion of negligence leads to a violent incident that results in a tragedy — or does it? — and it’s up to a court system to make sense of it in the aftermath, with all five people trapped in a situation spinning wildly out of control, as even seemingly minuscule incidents and white lies come back to haunt them. Of course — as the youngest characters come to realize — the truth isn’t any less complicated, anyway.

Asghar Farhadi wrote and directed, and the beauty of “A Separation” is that all of its characters retain a relatable point of view, and it’s hard for the viewer to simplistically assign blame or pick sides. Furthermore, as a glimpse into Iranian society, it’s humanizing and sobering; beyond all rhetoric, it’s encouraging to know that a story as well-told and as relatable as “A Separation” seems to be connecting with audiences everywhere. As it should. $30.99 DVD, $35.99 Blu-ray.

“BERNIE”

You’ve never seen Jack Black in a role like “Bernie,” Richard Linklater’s film based on a wild true-crime story that seems absurd even knowing its root in reality. Though the film’s odd ­documentary/re-enactment structure might seem off-putting and distancing at first — intercutting interviews, some with actual townspeople of Carthage, Texas, where the film takes place, into the action — Black nevertheless slides into the skin of Bernie Tiede, a charming funeral director with an outsized personality and a generous streak who proves himself one of the most popular men in his small town.

When he befriends a wealthy recent widow (Shirley Maclaine) with a mean streak, the townspeople chalk that up to Bernie just being a nice guy. He soon becomes her constant companion and reaps the benefits of her wealth.

While there’s never any doubt where “Bernie” is headed, I’ll stay vague just in case, only to say that things get more unusual and draw the attention of a suspicious district attorney (Matthew McConaughey).

Linklater — director of a varied number of films large and small, including “Before Sunrise,” “Dazed and Confused” and “School of Rock” — keeps things agreeably off-kilter as truth becomes far stranger than fiction. Its central performance really is a thing to behold, though; you wouldn’t have thought Black had it in him. $28.99 DVD, $29.99 Blu-ray.

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“THE DICTATOR”

Sacha Baron Cohen’s “The Dictator” follows one of his raucous, crude characters in an entirely scripted situation, a departure from his previous hits “Borat” and “Bruno,” where the butt of the joke was often on unsuspecting participants who would inevitably be shocked and disgusted. With “The Dictator,” I have to believe the butt of the joke is, by design, the audience, not because “The Dictator” is unfunny, which it is, mostly, but because its humor consists of throwing one (generally toothless) offensive or shocking thing after another at the audience, almost as a litmus test to see who’ll laugh.

It’s supposed to make you uncomfortable, I get it, and I’m no shrinking violet when it comes to risqué comedy, but I would like a comedy to come with jokes I find funny if it’s also going to judge me for laughing at it.

Cohen plays General Aladeen, a dictator of a fictional Middle East nation who rules his people with an iron fist. A trip to New York City — and a coup d’état at least partially orchestrated by the CIA, with a body double stepping into his place — sends him unrecognizable, stranded and alone into the city, where he meets a vegan feminist (Anna Faris) and takes a job at her grocery store. He has to somehow convince the world that he is the real dictator before the body double in his place does the unthinkable: brings democracy to his country.

Cohen is, as ever, committed to his role, but the material isn’t fresh and the satire is half-hearted. A big disappointment. $30.99 DVD, $40.99 Blu-ray.

“A SEPARATION”

Winner of the 2011 Academy Award for best foreign language film — and a nominee for best original screenplay, which is high praise given to a foreign film from the Academy, given their tendency to focus on American films almost exclusively — “A Separation” gets so complex and involving it’s almost miraculous, the sort of film that has the drive and narrative focus of a gripping thriller while telling what amounts to a low-key story of white lies, good intentions gone awry and irreconcilable moral issues. There are no easy solutions in “A Separation,” and the film is remarkable for it.

Set in modern-day Iran, the inciting incident surrounds Nader (Peyman Moadi) and Simin (Leila Hatami), a couple married for 14 years who now are petitioning for divorce. Simin wants to flee Iran, given largely unspoken tensions in the country, to seek a better life for her daughter (Sarina Farhadi). Nader will not move — he is the primary caretaker for his elderly, Alzheimer’s-afflicted father — and he won’t grant permission for his daughter to leave the country.

This situation is not resolved, and as Simin moves out of their apartment, Nader must hire extra help — a pregnant woman (Sareh Bayat) whose husband (Shahab Hosseini) has recently fallen on hard times — to take care of his dad.

But an occasion of negligence leads to a violent incident that results in a tragedy — or does it? — and it’s up to a court system to make sense of it in the aftermath, with all five people trapped in a situation spinning wildly out of control, as even seemingly minuscule incidents and white lies come back to haunt them. Of course — as the youngest characters come to realize — the truth isn’t any less complicated, anyway.

Asghar Farhadi wrote and directed, and the beauty of “A Separation” is that all of its characters retain a relatable point of view, and it’s hard for the viewer to simplistically assign blame or pick sides. Furthermore, as a glimpse into Iranian society, it’s humanizing and sobering; beyond all rhetoric, it’s encouraging to know that a story as well-told and as relatable as “A Separation” seems to be connecting with audiences everywhere. As it should. $30.99 DVD, $35.99 Blu-ray.

“BERNIE”

You’ve never seen Jack Black in a role like “Bernie,” Richard Linklater’s film based on a wild true-crime story that seems absurd even knowing its root in reality. Though the film’s odd ­documentary/re-enactment structure might seem off-putting and distancing at first — intercutting interviews, some with actual townspeople of Carthage, Texas, where the film takes place, into the action — Black nevertheless slides into the skin of Bernie Tiede, a charming funeral director with an outsized personality and a generous streak who proves himself one of the most popular men in his small town.

When he befriends a wealthy recent widow (Shirley Maclaine) with a mean streak, the townspeople chalk that up to Bernie just being a nice guy. He soon becomes her constant companion and reaps the benefits of her wealth.

While there’s never any doubt where “Bernie” is headed, I’ll stay vague just in case, only to say that things get more unusual and draw the attention of a suspicious district attorney (Matthew McConaughey).

Linklater — director of a varied number of films large and small, including “Before Sunrise,” “Dazed and Confused” and “School of Rock” — keeps things agreeably off-kilter as truth becomes far stranger than fiction. Its central performance really is a thing to behold, though; you wouldn’t have thought Black had it in him. $28.99 DVD, $29.99 Blu-ray.